DAFAQ ( Daily Ascii Frequently Asked Questions )

What DAFAQ is DAILY_ASCII?

What?

The source images come from flickr's public feed. This feed is never ending and ever changing. Every few seconds there are other images available trough the feed. DAILY_ASCII runs an automated script, that requests the feed once an hour at a random interval. On basis of pixel lightness the ascii image is generated.

Why?

Because it is fun to create something that does not need to have a practical purpose.

Why are some images unrecognisable?

Bear in mind that the resolution is scaled down ( to a max of 130 by 188 pixels ). The contrast of the source image plays a big part, as well as the scene and angle of the image.

Why the image size?

The ASCII image is sized so it will be printable on an A3 paper format.

How?

The image is resized to a smaller image. Than the script iterates over the image and reads every pixel color value. The lightness of the pixel is calculated ( rgba to hsla ). The lightness value is mapped to represent the relative lightntess of an ascii character. A matching ascii character is picked at random. This is done for every pixel. And voila we have ascii art.

I mean technically, how can I make something like this?

Part of the fun of projects like this, is building it yourself. Thinking up what you need and finding out how to do it. This site was build with php ( no Imagick ) - if you are planning on doing something similar - here are a few helpful links to get you started: